What I say unto you I say unto all, watch. Mark 13:37

December 01, 2011

Putin prepares the Russian empire to strike back

As prime minister for the past four years, Vladimir Putin
never really went away. But his looming reincarnation as the all-powerful,
executive president of Russia – the country’s “paramount leader” in Chinese
parlance – poses a stark challenge for which the US, Britain and other
beleaguered western powers seem ill-prepared. As president, potentially until
2024, Putin has one overriding objective: the creation of a third, post-tsarist,
post-Soviet Russian empire.

Putin famously described the collapse of the Soviet Union,
the “evil empire” of Ronald Reagan’s imagining, as “the greatest geopolitical
catastrophe of the century.” His aim, once this weekend’s heavily managed
parliamentary elections and next March’s presidential coronation are out the
way, is to put this disaster to rights. Reinstalled as president, and with his
political potboy, Dmitry Medvedev, pushed aside, Putin will again exercise
unchallengeable control over Russia’s external affairs.

Never much interested in domestic policy, Putin’s only
political trick is a hyper-nationalism that pits a proudly embattled Russia
against a hostile, US-led, world conspiracy. But the trick works. Despite
mounting criticism during the Duma campaign, both supporters and opponents
acknowledge his perceived achievement in restoring Russia’s standing in the
world following Boris Yeltsin’s chaotic 1990s decade.

Accepting the presidential nomination of his United Russia
party last month in an otherwise tedious speech, Putin said: “When I hear people
shout out ‘Russia’, I think the entire audience should do that.” The response,
according to witnesses, was a deafening chant of ‘Ro-see-ya! Ro-see-ya!” while
Putin pounded his fist on the podium.

Elements of Putin’s strategy to make Russia great again are
slowly coming into focus. Much of the plan is defined by Russia’s opposition to
the US, the traditional foe. Thus the Kremlin announced last week that it would
renounce the strategic arms reduction treaty (known as New Start) agreed with
Washington two years ago if the US did not abandon its European missile defence
plans.

This announcement, coupled with the unveiling of a new
Russian missile base in Kaliningrad on NATO’s doorstep, has striking
implications. New Start was the centrepiece of Barack Obama’s 2009 “reset” of
bilateral relations. The reset is viewed by the White House as a major foreign
achievement (and 2012 re-election asset) for a president who has but few to his
name.

Missile defence ostensibly aimed at deterring Iran is seen as
another success. With the US preoccupied by wars in the Middle East and South
Asia and fixated by the Arab spring, a quiet Russian “front” has been deemed
essential by Washington. Putin appears set to change all that.

On his eastern flank, meanwhile, Putin is busy reviving the
idea of a remodelled union embracing the former Soviet republics of central
Asia, an arrangement that prospectively boosts Russian political and military
influence. “Russia will begin this new iteration of a Russian empire by creating
a union with former Soviet states based on Moscow’s current associations, such
as the customs union and the collective security treaty organisation. This will
allow the ‘EuU’ [a Eurasia union] to strategically encompass both the economic
and security spheres … Putin is creating a union in which Moscow would influence
foreign policy and security but would not be responsible for most of the inner
workings of each country,” said Lauren Goodrich in a Stratfor paper.

Following last month’s Gazprom deal with Belarus, industry
analysts suggest up to 50% of Europe’s natural gas could be controlled by Russia
by 2030. This is hugely significant: Putin’s new Russian empire can only be
financed by continuing, high-priced energy export revenues. In effect, Europe
could be paying for its own future domination.

The empire-fights-back scenario has numerous other aspects.
Recent remarks by Medvedev about the lack of wisdom, in the context of the 2008
Georgia conflict, of unchecked NATO enlargement vividly illustrated Russia’s
visceral opposition to any interference in what used to be called its “near
abroad” – and Putin’s desire to roll back the western encroachments of the past
20 years. Russia’s determination to defend wider spheres of traditional
influence in the non-aligned and developing world can be seen in its obdurate
refusal to penalise Syria, in the face of almost universal outrage over the
crackdown there; and in its de facto defence of Iran’s nuclear programme. Putin,
meanwhile, continues to prioritise Russian military modernisation.

Western countries inclined to take issue with this external
empire-building, or with Russia’s lamentable internal democracy and human rights
deficit, have been told to save their breath. “All our foreign partners need to
understand this: Russia is a democratic country, it’s a reliable and predictable
partner with which they can and must reach agreement, but on which they cannot
impose anything from the outside,” Putin told the United Russia convention.
Attempts to influence the election process or the reform agenda were “a wasted
effort, like throwing money to the winds“.

As Putin – former secret policeman, physical fitness fanatic
and hyper-nationalist – prepares to resume Russia’s presidency, his third empire
ambitions become ever clearer. March’s election will be no contest. Only when it
is over will the real fight begin. †